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Social Media Basics

I am an 80's kid working hard to understand and keep afloat with the ever changing technologies. Whatever year you were born, it is quite likely some of these social media platforms are new to you. There have been so many changes in the last few decades when it comes to technology and computers. I have been writing for the majority of my life with a focus on creative writing, research writing, and essay writing. There are so many social networking sites, platforms, and ways information can be dispersed. I have learned so much and will do my best to explain all of this. Blog:What is a blog? That is a good start for this post. If you know just move to the next paragraph. If you don't let's go over this. A blog is a type of website which has entries and/or posts. Blogs typically are updated frequently but there are differences in entry or post updates. Blogs can have a single author or multiple authors. Blogs typically have a collection of entries that focus on a particular interest or study or cover multiple interest or study. A blog is what someone wants it to be. Some people blog and share selectively as a diary or journal. Some people blog as a hobby to share with others from all kinds of platforms and at different levels. Some people blog as a part time job and make money through AdSense, freelance writing, ghost writing, guest writing, or building a foundation and/or following to lead into a book release. Some people blog as a career and do very well at it. There are bloggers that live very comfortably writing blogs with rich, consistent, and well written content. A blog is not easily defined as for every blogger there is uniqueness. A blogger has to stand out in some way to climb amongst the millions of people that blog. A blogger will likely find the most success with consistent and well written content, the ability to market and get the blog to as many active and interested people as possible, and can deliver useful and interesting information. Blogger:Blogger is a service which allow time stamped blogs which can be single or multiple person entries. It was developed by Pyra labs in August 1999 and purchased in February 2003 by Google. The blogs are generally hosted by Google at a subdomain of blogspot.com but the site can also host the blog but a personal domain name can be used. Blogger is free and allows flexibility which makes it attractive. Blogger connects seamlessly with Google+ which allows the user to reach out and network with other bloggers and communities. Blogger is a blog site that is easy to navigate, allows personalized templates, and allows variety from adding pictures to font and style changes. Blogger has most of what a person interested in blogging will need. Wordpress:Wordpress is a web software that allows a user to create a blog, app, or website. Wordpress started in May of 2003. It is the largest and most popular self hosted blogging system in the world developed by WordPress Foundation. The founders for WordPress are Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. WordPress is customizable and attractive. WordPress is used by more than 23% of the top million websites in the world. WordPress is used by Coca Cola, The NFL Channel, and The Wall Street Journal, and CNN.Google+:Google+ is the Google platforms baby. Google+ has millions of users. There are communities to search, scroll, and find. Google+ unifies the users experience across the Google platform from leaving a review on a YouTube video or Google Maps.

I have found Google+ to be great for finding fellow bloggers, American Pit Bull Terrier owners, fellow arm wrestlers, strongman athletes, and powerlifters. Google+ allows its user to find others that are interested in the same things which opens all kinds of doors for an advertiser, blogger, and networker.

Google+ is sophisticated and powerful in the area of advertising and platform rising. Facebook:Facebook was launched in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovits, and Chris Hughes who were all Harvard University students. They created this website to put students in touch with each other. They called it thefacebook.com and it became popular at the Harvard campus. Soon after, the students at Columbia, Stanford, and Yale were added to participants. In 2005, 800+ colleges across the U.S. could join. In August of 2005 the name of the site was changed to Facebook. Facebook was initially intended for college students but it did not take long for everyone interested to join. Facebook is a social networking site which allows content sharing, writing, picture sharing, liking of others content, chat, Facebook's own version of email, video playing, researching, etc. A Facebook user can join networks which are organized into four categories which are regions, colleges, workplaces, and high schools. Facebook has its own search engine capabilities. Facebook is constantly evolving based on research, marketing, advertising/advertisers, user needs and interests, and trends.Myspace:Myspace is a social networking service owned by Specific Media LLC and pop star Justin Timberlake. Myspace launched in August 2003 and its headquarters are in Beverly Hills California. Myspace was acquired by News Corporation in July 2005 for $580 million. In April 2008, Facebook overtook Myspace in the Alexa rankings. Since that time, Myspace has had a continual loss of users. Myspace was said to be too wide ranging but not deep enough in its developments and user needs. Basically it went with a lot of products that were too shallow and not the best products in the world. Myspace focused on entertainment and music whereas Facebook was wide, deep, and continually changing with user trends and needs. In June 2011, Myspace announced to label partners and press via email it had been acquired by Specific Media for an undisclosed amount of money. Justin Timberlake also took on an ownership stake. Myspace seems to be making a comeback in 2015 and I would expect the site to push itself back into the mainstream at any time. Twitter:Twitter is an online networking tool. Twitter allows updates about things people find funny, interesting, entertaining, Twitter can be used as a newsfeed, networking, microblogging, or as a chatroom. Twitter users can control who they follow. Twitter is a sufficient way to get information out to people. Many people use hashtags (#) followed by a specific word or words to start conversations or group things together. Signing up for Twitter is quite easy and it is free. Once signed up just find friends to follow and navigate around until you get the hang of things. Twitter is a great way to network and advertise what you have to share with others whether that is a blog, business, or product.Tumblr:Tumblr is a microblogging platform and social networking website founded in 2007. It was founded by David Karp and is owned by Yahoo Inc. The website allows its users to post content and multimedia to a short blog. Users can follow other blogs, share, like, and comment as they choose. Users can make their blogs private or public. Tumblr hosts over 266 million blogs as of December 2015. Users are able to connect their Tumblr blogs to their Twitter and Facebook accounts. Tumblr is easy to share what the user is into. It is easy to sign up, pick and name, and begin posting. A user can upload a picture, include a title, and write about it with minimal words or many. The Tumblr page is easy to customize. Tumblr has class and distinction. Instagram:Instagram was created by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger. It was released on October 6 2010. Instagram is an online photo sharing, social networking, and video sharing service. The app has over 300 million users. The app was acquired by Facebook in April 2012 for approximately 1 billion in cash and stock. On December 12 2013, Instagram added Direct which was a feature created to allow users to send photos directly to specific people. This direct photo sharing was created to compete with Snapchat. Instagram allows users to apply filters to enhance and personalize photos. Snapchat:Shapchat is a video messaging app developed by Bobby Murphy, Evan Spiegel, and Reggie Brown when they were students at Stanford University. Snapchat was released in September of 2011. Users can take photographs or videos and add drawings and personalized text. These "snaps" can be sent to chosen recipients. Users control how long the photographs remain visible from 1 to 10 seconds before they are removed from the Snapchat servers. Snapchat users send approximately 2 billion videos and photos each day. Snapchat is a fun and free app that is easy to learn and understand. Snapchat has value in promoting business, hobby, or for entertainment purposes. There are so many uses for Snapchat and it is a very popular app. Flickr:Flickr was created by Ludicorp and cofounded by Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake. It was launched on February 10th 2004 by Ludicorp and it is an image hosting and video hosting website. It was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and acquired by Yahoo in 2005.Both Stewart and Caterina resigned in 2008. Flickr is popular for photographers both professional and hobby and bloggers to put images online that they place on social media and on blogs. Flickr has one of the best photo sharing and management apps.Pinterest:Pinterest is a photo sharing website launched in March of 2010. The founders are Paul Sciarra, Evan Sharp, and Ben Silberman. The app is a photo collecting. discovery, and storage tool. Users post pictures they find interesting or relevant to a category or community they are interested in. The pictures collected called pins, under the specific headings allow other users to connect based on similar interests and ideas. Pinterest CEO Ben Silberman notes his company is a "catalog of ideas" rather than as a social network, that inspires users to "go out and do that thing." (Wikipedia.) Pinterest has shown to be especially popular among women who comprise approximately 85% of its following. Pinterest has 176 million registered users as of December 2015 (expandedramblings.com) Pinterest is a sophisticated way to connect users by the things they find interesting. Youtube:Youtube is a video sharing website created by three former Paypal employees, Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim in February 2005. YouTube was independently owned from 2005-2006 and owned by Google from 2006-present. In November 2006, it was purchased by Google for $1.65 billion. The site allows users to upload, view, and share videos. Many individuals and companies upload videos to YouTube. YouTube has AdSense and other advertising which can make YouTube channel users make money. Summary:There are so many ways to enjoy all of this technology. You could share pictures on Pinterest, create a blog on WordPress or Blogger, send a tweet about the concert you are at on Twitter, or post a picture of your favorite photo on Flickr. If you are a blogger or photographer, there are so many ways to ensure you are seen by Google+ communities completely mesmerized by your attention to detail and talent within your passion. I am an 80's kid and I have found a way to understand much of this and I believe you can also. If you get stuck, remember that Youtube and Google are helpful. Simply type your question on the search line and look around until you see something helpful. Good luck.